# Remove Rule #2 - Bumping



## surskitty (Nov 30, 2008)

If it'd be worthy of infraction for a bump, it's either spam or borderline-spam.  Having the rule against bumping also encourages duplicate threads because people are worried that their (likely valid) contribution would lead to penalties simply because the thread's old.

Instead, I propose changing the rule for spam to mention that it's more likely to be punished if the thread's old.


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## Tailsy (Nov 30, 2008)

The rules already say that it's fine to bump if the discussion is still relevant. Which it is. It seems a bit pointless to me. :S


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## cillian_murphy_fangirl (Nov 30, 2008)

I think the rule is perfectly fine.
But that's just my worthless opinion.
xP


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## Zhorken (Nov 30, 2008)

Streamlining the rules and making them less ambiguous looks good to me; people seem to be confused about the fact that bringing back threads is okay.


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## surskitty (Nov 30, 2008)

Tailsy said:


> The rules already say that it's fine to bump if the discussion is still relevant. Which it is. It seems a bit pointless to me. :S


Which doesn't stop people from reporting perfectly-valid posts that then get infracted (and reversed) simply because they didn't start a new thread.


People don't seem to get that it's much more of DON'T SPAM IN OLD THREADS than DON'T REVIVE OLD THREADS.


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## Tailsy (Nov 30, 2008)

surskitty said:


> Which doesn't stop people from reporting perfectly-valid posts that then get infracted (and reversed) simply because they didn't start a new thread.
> 
> 
> People don't seem to get that it's much more of DON'T SPAM IN OLD THREADS than DON'T REVIVE OLD THREADS.


I don't infract people for reviving valid threads. ?_? Does anyone? When? I don't notice.

Besides even if the rule was removed people would still be reporting posts for bumping. I don't think it would make that much difference.


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## surskitty (Nov 30, 2008)

I know Negrek has!

Eh, it's not so much infracting for bumping that bothers me so much as people posting duplicate threads because they're worried about getting infracted for bumping.


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## Negrek (Dec 1, 2008)

*shrug* I infract for bumping because it's pretty clear in the rules that reviving dead threads is frowned upon. I don't usually see the threads being revived as being particularly useful. Most of the threads that people care about get replied to frequently enough that they don't end up getting bumped, or they're stickied such that it doesn't matter. While the posts made to bump usually aren't spam within the context of the thread, they tend to be made in threads where people have already stopped caring and which just stagger on for a few more posts after the bump before dying again. That is, a lot of bumped threads are, in my experience, survey sort of threads (what is your favorite ____?) or opinion threads (e.g. team rating threads), and don't really have a lot of "discussion" to them or which rapidly become dated. To me, reviving those seems quite pointless.

As for duplicate threads, I don't like to see them either, but so far as I know they tend to happen most frequently with threads that undergo boom and bust periods, like the "where did you get your username thread," which pop up periodically, undergo a lot of activity, and then sink again until someone new decides that it would be a good idea to make one, since they don't see one around. Ideally those sort of things would be stickied, but there's obviously no room for all of them. I wouldn't infract for someone reviving one of those threads because I know they're likely to come up again anyway.

In short, I don't see that we need to get rid of the bumping rule because I don't think it usually discourages good posts. From what I've seen, that being in areas of the forum I pay attention to, most bumps fail to generate new, meaningful discussion.

I didn't realize those infractions were reversed; I thought that all reversed infractions showed up with a reply in the infraction log. If I had noticed that they were being reversed, I would have brought this up earlier.


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## surskitty (Dec 1, 2008)

I think I only did it once though....  [fails]

Duplicate noise threads're probably a bit more annoying than simply having one RANDOM POLL thread, though, and merging is annoying whenever someone actually noticed that the thread exists because it's like ARGH WHY DID YOU NOT JUST BUMP IT D:.


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## Tarvos (Dec 1, 2008)

usually there's an old thread which validates the.... *gasp* search function


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## surskitty (Dec 1, 2008)

search function brings up a lot of irrelevant crap though

clearly this is a job for TAGGING!!


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## Negrek (Dec 2, 2008)

> I think I only did it once though.... [fails]


I know you reversed this one, but it doesn't show that it was reversed anywhere I can see (besides the user's profile).

Anyway, I'd guess that more duplicate threads are created because people don't bother to search back in the forum before posting than because of bumping fears, but I could be wrong.


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## surskitty (Dec 2, 2008)

I know I've seen a few notes of "I know I saw this before but I didn't want to bump" :(


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## Negrek (Dec 2, 2008)

Eh, perhaps I should emerge from the ASB forum once in a while.

_Anyway_, other people wanting to weigh in on this matter?


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## Philly (Dec 2, 2008)

I wish to weigh in with my hated opinions!
I think that if it is a bump that has nothing to do with it and actually IS spam it should be a major infraction, but if it is relevant, and say, it is like an RP that died for no good reason, like maybe the DM left or something, you should be able to bump it and see if people are still willing to contribute, instead of letting it die without a choice.


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## Shiny Grimer (Dec 2, 2008)

surskitty said:


> I know I've seen a few notes of "I know I saw this before but I didn't want to bump" :(


Most forums I go to have staff that are pretty anal about bumping and so I prefer to make new threads than revive an old one.

Also, people's opinions change over time. If there is an old thread and someone sees that they've already posted in it, even if they have something new to add, they might be discouraged from posting because they've already said something.

That being said, the bumping rule should be made clearer. I know I am confused by it sometimes.


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## surskitty (Dec 2, 2008)

iphillip1 said:


> it is like an RP that died for no good reason, like maybe the DM left or something


But uh that's a _good_ reason.


Being anal about bumping sucks, considering how duplicate threads are much more annoying.  :(


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## ultraviolet (Dec 2, 2008)

I don't really have a problem with duplicate threads as long as there's only one active at a time which is usually the case. Besides, reviving an old thread brings up complications - like someone bumped an old introduction thread recently and everyone was like 'What? You joined ages ago'. 

Is it really a problem to have duplicate threads? I mean, providing we don't have three 'what's your favourite pokemon' threads or something, I don't really see how it's an issue to have duplicate threads, one ancient and the other one new. It doesn't really affect the search/tag features because if you're searching for threads then they usually appear chronologically anyway, don't they?

I don't know if bumping should be allowed in the Debating Hall, though - more often than not, people don't read the threads and bring up points that have already been argued for/against multiple times and if people bump _and _don't read the thread it's going to piss a lot of Hall-goers off. But then it's not often that people create duplicate Debating Hall threads anyway, so uh, I'm not really sure. 

I guess Roleplaying threads should probably be bumped rather than making the same RPs over again just because the players lose interest. But if roleplayers have lost interest then isn't that a good reason for it to die...?

Perhaps you guys could make a cut-off age for whether a thread should be bumped or not - eg, if the old thread is x months old, make a new one instead of bumping it.


ugh long post is long


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## surskitty (Dec 2, 2008)

If you're bumping an ancient introduction thread, it's spam by that point anyway.  It's no longer relevant.


Duplicate threads are clutter, though, which's annoying.  Why should I have to look through two threads on the exact same topic if I know I posted in one?


More often than not, people post in the Debating Hall without reading the thread _anyway_.  Bumping threads means that maybe people won't have to repeat themselves quite as much.


There currently _is_ a cutoff age, but it's kind of dumb when it leads to things like multiple threads where people post their favourite quotes.  I'm suggesting removing the rule against bumping or at least rewording it since if the thread's old enough that whatever someone posts is not relevant, then it's spam anyway, while if someone's just going to post an identical thread, they might as well revive the old one.  The rules as-written allow for that, but it's fairly frequent that people don't get it.


Also note that sometimes RPs die because someone was away for a bit: there's no reason why not to bump it if it was "um I'm kinda dead currently brb" or "yaaaay vacation BE BACK EVENTUALLY" rather than "THIS IS BORING".


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## ultraviolet (Dec 3, 2008)

But consider; if an original thread was ancient and a new thread was created then the original thread would be back by a couple pages anyway, one would think and people would post in the new one. I mean if you leave a thread for a few months it gets bumped back to like page three in most boards. I don't see how this is clutter, but you're the mod, so -shrug-

Also there's always the 'find all posts by x' option it you can't remember which one you posted in.


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## Valor (Dec 3, 2008)

I already bumped the Show your Desktop thread, I say it can be perfectly fine to do so.

With the forum wipe, there aren't any ancient threads to bump anyway that would look awkward. The other forum I frequent (And mod), we've had a few instances where a person bumped a thread from 2004. Rather pointless. However, the oldest threads here are about half a year old, so I don't see much problem with bumping them, no matter what page they're on. The mark should probably be at a year before becoming less lenient in terms of what the content is that the bumper posted.


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## surskitty (Dec 3, 2008)

Not really, no: there's no point posting in threads that are very obviously dated and discussion is likely irrelevant after around a week.  :/


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